Proving Mount Everst Can Be Climbed?

[RSLancastr]

On another forum, in a discussion regarding the lack of scientific evidence for psychics, a believer said:

It is like you cannot scientifically test that Mount Everest can be climbed. And yet...

By the way: can you show scientifically that what is told in all the programs about WWII ever happened? See what I mean?

Neither comment makes the slightest bit of sense to me. I have some thoughts on a reply, but thought I'd ask for some input here first.

How would you (civilly) respond to that?

 

[Major Billy]

Show them some pictures?

 

[drkitten]

On another forum, in a discussion regarding the lack of scientific evidence for psychics, a believer said:

Neither comment makes the slightest bit of sense to me. I have some thoughts on a reply, but thought I'd ask for some input here first.

How would you (civilly) respond to that?

I think -- well, first, I think that your correspondant can't write for toffee -- but more than that, I think that they're talking about the problem of historical verification.

To start out with, they're completely wrong. I can easily prove that Everest can be climbed, simply by having someone climb it. I can give someone the necessary recording equipment, and can even arrange an aerial flyover at the appropriate time to confirm the existence of someone on the summit. On the other hand, if I didn't have that capacity, how would I confirm that it had in fact been climbed? Sir Edmund (Hilary) might well have only gotten about 90% of the way up, then said to his Sherpas, "the hell with it, let's just go home and tell everyone that we made it."

Similarly, how do I confirm that WWII really happened (or that any particular event really happened)?

The answer, of course, is to consult the "historical record" -- demonstrable artifacts (for example, we can see the garbage at the top of Everest that is demonstrably left by humans unless oxygen bottles grow naturally at high altitudes) or documentary evidence that's sufficiently validated that it's not reasonably written off as a forgery or fiction.

 

[Number Six]

You can't test if it's possible in theory to climb Mt. Everest. But you can test a particular person's claim that they can climb it. Similarly, we can't test whether psychichs could theoretically exist but we can test individual psychics. And we do and they fail. So we can conclude that true psychics haven't yet been shown to exist. That doesn't mean it will never happen.

WW II is not a repeatable experiment that we can conduct in a lab but rather it is a past event. We can point to evidence to tell that it happened and what happened during it.

 

[brodski]

If I where you I wouldn't bother, you're gazing into an abyss of woo there, and remember the abyss also gazes.
but for point 1 I would point out the wealth of experimental data from those who (knowingly or not) have tested the hypothesis that "Everest can be climbed"m they have reported their data back, Just because they weren't in lab coats doesn't mean that it's not empirical evidence, and if anyone still has doubts, well everest has not gone anywhere, it is very easy for a team to attempt to replicated and confirm the previous results.
as for 2 I would admit that most TV history is of questionable value, which is why professional historians spend their time research what happened, yes there will always be some doubt, but some events are so well documented or otherwise supported by evidence, to claim they didn't happen is ridiculous.
The point about psychs is not that you can't test for psychics, the point is they HAVE been tested, and every single one of them has failed miserably.

 

[RSLancastr]

Thanks, all. My approach was very much like Number Six's.

And brodski, thanks for the abyssmal advice!

 

[gfunkusarelius]

yeah sounds like a philosophical debate rather than a discussion about science. the old "dragon in my garage" paradox. if you start venturing whether anything is really "real" and what "real" means, you may as well throw away science.

 

[dogjones]

The theoretical possibility of climbing Mount Everest and the theoretical possibility of the existence of psychics are hardly "apples to apples" comparisons.

You could get pretty close to "scientifically" proving the possibility of climbing Mt Everest. Using, among other things, physics, meteorology, biology, geography, etc you could work out what a human would need in order to work within the constraints of our known physical universe to achieve this goal. How much food, oxygen, etc would be needed. What physical condition a person would need to be in. What route to take. Etc, etc. Then, of course, you could test it.

As 'psychics' do not work within the constraints of known physical laws, well, different question. It would come down to "which known physical laws would we have to discard or modify (probably on an entirely ad hoc basis) to make it possible for psychics to exist". Unless you're an SF/Fantasy writer, why bother to pursue this vague, time-consuming and whimsical enquiry when we have no reason to? This is one of the reasons why the JREF only tests specific claims and ignores pointless theorizing. (And of course, to echo Number Six, every specific claim has failed.)

 

[Dr Adequate]

As with any other hypothesis, you can ask: what evidence would be available to us if Mount Everest had been climbed? What evidence would be available to us if WWII had taken place? And then you can compare what you would see under those hypotheses with what you do see. If the two match, this is experimental confirmation of your hypothesis.

And then you could ask: what evidence would we see if people really could communicate with the dead? And we compare this with what we do see, and we find the evidence to be lacking. And then the excuses begin.

This is why the JREF does not offer a million dollars to anyone who can prove that Everest has been climbed or that WWII took place.

 

[Mojo]

On another forum, in a discussion regarding the lack of scientific evidence for psychics, a believer said:

It is like you cannot scientifically test that Mount Everest can be climbed. And yet...

By the way: can you show scientifically that what is told in all the programs about WWII ever happened? See what I mean?

Neither comment makes the slightest bit of sense to me. I have some thoughts on a reply, but thought I'd ask for some input here first.

How would you (civilly) respond to that?

Have you tried showing them this?
Parachute use to prevent death and major trauma related to gravitational challenge: systematic review of randomised controlled trials

As with many interventions intended to prevent ill health, the effectiveness of parachutes has not been subjected to rigorous evaluation by using randomised controlled trials. Advocates of evidence based medicine have criticised the adoption of interventions evaluated by using only observational data. We think that everyone might benefit if the most radical protagonists of evidence based medicine organised and participated in a double blind, randomised, placebo controlled, crossover trial of the parachute.

 

[Soapy Sam]

A British Army team recently did live broadcasts from Everest. They failed to make the top though.

As to WW2, I have a pic somewhere of Scottish troops marching through Sicily. My old man is near the front of the line. Anecdotal of course, but it convinced me. That and the way he used to wake up, screaming.

 

[brodski]

This is why the JREF does not offer a million dollars to anyone who can prove that Everest has been climbed or that WWII took place.

No, the JREF doesn't offer the million to those claims, because they can't be scientifically tested.

 

[Mr. Skinny]

I think perhaps that you should start out by asking the somewhat standard question(s): "What evidence (scientific or not?) would convince you that Everest had been climbed, and that WWII occured?"

Proceed from there.

 

[grayman]

WW II is not a repeatable experiment that we can conduct in a lab but rather it is a past event. We can point to evidence to tell that it happened and what happened during it.

And yet there are many that will claim the Holocaust never happened.

 

[Pidge]

OOOOO. I could see a younger Edmund Hillary doing a "Buzz Aldrin" on that woo/kook/imbecile.

 

[gumboot]

Sir Edmund (Hilary) might well have only gotten about 90% of the way up, then said to his Sherpas, "the hell with it, let's just go home and tell everyone that we made it."

Unfortunately that wouldn't explain this photograph. Caption:

Tenzing Norgay on the summit of Mount Everest at 11.30 a.m.
Tenzing waves his ice-axe bearing the flags of Great Britain, Nepal, the United Nations, and India.
Photo: Edmund Hillary, May 29, 1953

-Andrew

 

[Foster Zygote]

On another forum, in a discussion regarding the lack of scientific evidence for psychics, a believer said:

Neither comment makes the slightest bit of sense to me. I have some thoughts on a reply, but thought I'd ask for some input here first.

How would you (civilly) respond to that?

That comment about WWII sounds unnervingly like something from the Center for Historical Review.

Steven

 

[Luke T.]

It is like you cannot scientifically test that Mount Everest can be climbed.

I think that is so self-evidently stupid you should just put it in your signature with the guy's name attached on whatever website it is, and leave it at that.

 

[Roboramma]

You can't test if it's possible in theory to climb Mt. Everest.

Maybe I'm just disagreeing with your phrasing of this, but clearly it is possible to test if it's possible in theory to climb Mt. Everest. If someone climbs it, you've shown that it is possible in theory to climb Mt. Everest.
What you might not be able to do is to design a test that would be conclusive either way. That is, if no one had ever climbed Everest, sending a team up there might prove that it can be climbed (if they succeeded), but it wouldn't prove that it can't be climbed (if they failed, because someone else might succeed next year).

Which seems to be your point anyway.

 

[Arkan_Wolfshade]

On another forum, in a discussion regarding the lack of scientific evidence for psychics, a believer said:

Neither comment makes the slightest bit of sense to me. I have some thoughts on a reply, but thought I'd ask for some input here first.

How would you (civilly) respond to that?

The poster on the other forum is trying to shift the burden of proof. I think what the poster is doing is saying that the burden of proof is on science to disprove psychics and, since disproving a negative is usually a fallacy (as well pointe out by Roborama) the poster is claiming victory.

To put it another way:
RSLancastr: We have no evidence of psychic abilities, so your claim that they exist is wrong.
Poster: I'm not claiming they exist, you're claiming they don't exist; and just because you don't have proof that they do exist, doesn't mean they don't exist. (absence of evidence is not evidence of absence)

To answer the poster on the other forum, merely remind them that the burden of proof is on their shoulders.